Latest hand-picked pre-orders

Seasoned guitarist Bill MacKay returns to Drag City with new LP Fountain Fire. The Chicagoan’s latest effort is a collection of sprawling and psychedelic instrumental Americana. The likes of ‘Pre-California’ find a sweet spot between the widescreen vistas of Wilco and the peyote haze of Hejira-era Joni Mitchell.

Blabbermouth is the fun new project from Lu Edmonds (of The Damned and PiL) and Mark Roberts (of D-Ream and The Godfathers). On Hörspiel the pair provide a soundtrack varying from industrial to ambient while a synthetic speech robot reads texts found on the internet in different languages. Artificial-intelligence-anxiety-core.

Some might call Cranes’ genre-defying mix of dreampop with gothic instrumentations melodramatic, others would say it’s revolutionary. We won’t take much of a stand here: either way, their debut Wings of Joy is being brought back to life by the kind folks at Music on Vinyl. Dive right back into their experimental take on early 90s shoegaze!

The prodigal son returns! Earl Sweatshirt serves up his third solo LP Some Rap Songs three years on the troubled I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside. Well, we say LP - at just shy of 25 minutes, Some Rap Songs is as brief as they come. However, this brevity plays to the Off Future man’s strengths as he serves up a series of quick-fire impressionist hip-hop takes. He also sounds a little happier than before - some of the beats could almost be described as ‘sunny’.

Flamingods aren't just any old psych rock band. For this their second full length album they have soaked themselves in the vibes of the disco funk and psychedelic sounds which came out of the Middle East and South Asia in the 1970s. This has resulted in an uplifting and sun-drenched brand of exotic psychedelia aimed at getting people dancing.  

Gigi Masin’s private press LP Wind gets a proper issuing thanks to The Bear On The Moon. Masin’s ambient songs drift on a bed of synths, in a way that plenty of obscurity-hunters have fallen for over the years. You could let it colour your room, or you could follow his songcraft: your choice. This reissue is remastered from the original tapes.

There's already been a band called Fuck now we have Good Fuck which I suppose narrows down the description a bit. This is no normal Fuck. It's a good one. Well you know who it is is don't you? It's bloody Tim Kinsella (Joan of Arc, Cap’n Jazz) with Jenny Pulse (Spa Moans).  Together they make oddball dark electronica and one of their songs is called Jenny Dreams of Pies.  

....And they are invincible aren't they? Jad and David Fair have long been proponents of outsider music but now in 2019 they sound rather steady and listenable if it weren't for Jad's screechy freeform vocals which continue to give the band an air of unpredictability in the best traditions of Daniel Johnston and Jonathan Richman.    

With the big paydays from those Stone Roses reunion gigs apparently wrapped up for now, Ian Brown has got back into solo music-making: Ripples is his first solo material to land in nine years. The wider Brown family are all over this record, with Ian’s sons contributing to both songwriting and musical performances. That’s pretty sweet really. Ripples is out from Virgin EMI.

Have you heard? Music is a secret. Release announced on the week the CD comes out with the vinyl coming 'some time in the future', you have to remember that this is a James Blake record not some kind of secret government experiment. Anyway the crybaby songster (we say that simply because it pisses him off so much) has a new record out which you can listen to and buy (maybe).    

Recording of a live collaborative improvisation by the saxophone's John Butcher and the harp's Rhodri Davies. Both musician's are known for pushing their instruments to their limits, playing fearlessly and ferociously. When they do this together, the world is at their feet. Drunk on Dreams took place on Radio France in 2015 and is now issued on Cejero.

One of the great British films of all time, Ken Loach's 'Kes' is an atmospheric classic for any of us who grew up in the North of England but the soundtrack by John Cameron is equally evocative. He put together a crack jazz line up to get into the heart of the film and so the soundtrack will appeal to jazz as well as film buffs. A beautiful daydream antidote to an all too real South Yorkshire nightmare. This is the real thing. This is beauty so fragile it hurts" says Jarvis Cocker in his liner notes.  

Look who has got together to collab? It's just Karen O lead singer from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and 'super' producer Danger Mouse who has worked with pretty much every musician ever. Together they've made a record which, reading between the lines, pushes each others sound out towards the furthest limits with the duo have inspiring each other to take risks. 

What do you get when you get two math rock stalwarts who've worked with the likes of Earth, Exes and Sex Swing and reconnect them after they drifted apart. The answer it turns out, is Markers. On Heaven in the Dark Earth, Jason Carty and Jodie Cox make vulnerable sounding stripped back post-rock in the vein of Rodan's more introspective moments.

Yes it is Maximum Joy. I'm not exactly sure of why we've lost all their vowels but the press release describes this as a dramatic re-imagining by founding members Janine Rainforth and Charlie Llewellin. Maximum Joy were once described as "one of the Slits backed by the Gang of Four" which is pretty accurate indeed. Here we have a new line up with a new take on their sound marrying their original influences (Afrobeat, reggae, avant-garde jazz, funk and pop) with dark electronics, samples and effects.   

Body of Work is a compilation album by Industrial synth punks Nitzer Ebb. it was originally released back 2006. It’s an overview of the band’s output between 1984 and 1997 and contains classics such as Warsaw Ghetto and Join The Chant. Mute are reissuing the band’s back catalogue which means that this nifty little set is being released on vinyl for the first time. 4LP red/white vinyl set on Mute.

This has got to be good news for a certain breed of early 4AD worshippers. Rema Rema made one EP back in 1980 before splitting up and ending up in such bands as Renegade Soundwave, The Wolfgang Press and Adam and the Ants. Fast forward to now and some pretty committed people have got together to try to stitch together what would have been their debut LP by way of live recordings, alternate takes and rehearsal recordings.   

First full-length album from young producer Rian Treanor. ATAXIA is accordingly a tighter and more rigorously organised set of tracks, with intense rhythmic structures and precisely calibrated synthesis. But in case that sounds alienating, fear not, because Treanor’s sound leaves plenty of room for the dance as well as the home listening environment. On Planet Mu.

Winchester's finest (other than the cathedral maybe) Rozi Plain is back with a brand new album. Her fourth (we think) is another self produced effort following on from the much acclaimed Friend released on Lost Map back in 2015. She's a busy lass, playing with This Is The Kit as well as touring her own stuff, painting boats, being creative and all those good things. There was a Dinked edition but it's gone now slowpokes.   

Shana Cleveland is the voice of La Luz, but working solo for a change on this here Night Of The Worm Moon album allows her to travel further afield in terms of sound and content. This is an LA dreamer’s album, with UFO sightings and other night-moods represented with sun-tipped psychedelic singer-songwriter new-folk. Very West Coast, very good. On Hardly Art.

Hieronymus Bosch, other than having one of the all time great names, was one of the greatest and most visionary painters ever to have lived. A compelling starting point for an album then, as Susanna & the Brotherhood of Our Lady show on Garden of Earthy Delights. Susanna has drawn from Bosch's ability to find beauty in the sinful and the disgusting, and the ugly in the saintly and alluring. 

O.M.G. it's the 10th anniversary of The Antlers 'Hospice' so literally put everything that you are doing down and re-buy the album that Pitchfork gave a whopping 8.5 out of 10 to in 2008. Re-live its swooning and emotional mid-paced indie, glacial atmospheric synth work, heartfelt trumpets and random noise bursts. It's just like Arcade Fire were a shoegaze band.   

At last! A re-issue of The Brian Jonestown Massacre LP which prompted the spat between our very own Phil Leigh and Brian Jonestown Massacre leader Anton Newcombe which culminated in the latter very accurately labelling the former a 'grumpy little tit'. Re-live that moment whilst listening to the album Phil described rather inaccurately "a bit like every period of Primal Scream on one album".   

Now weirdly busier than ever, Anton Newcombe was planning two albums for 2018 but the success of Something Else and it's associated tours has led this self titled follow up to be pushed back to 2019. Well at least we have a brand new the Brian Jonestown Massacre album to listen to before we all die.  Something Else was really rather good so we are looking forward to the treats on offer here.  

The Cinematic Orchestra do not work with haste. To Believe is their first full, proper studio album since 2007’s Ma Fleur, and its title track (with gorgeous vocals from Moses Sumney) has been circulating as a single since 2016. But now, when they are good and ready, they present To Believe in full! Guests include Heidi Vogel and the great Roots Manuva, and this one promises to be another deep classic. On Ninja Tune.

Ah this is sad. The Cranberries were working on a new album at the time of Dolores O'Riordan’s untimely passing but she died before they could play it to anyone. The remaining members have decided to finish up the music and release it both as a tribute to the late singer and for fans who have waited years to hear new music from the band. 

Massively expanded edition of the sixth album by Factory Records veteran Vini Reilly. Having been gifted electronic equipment by label boss Tony Wilson, Reilly set about devising fresh contexts for his liquid guitar playing. The Stephen Street-produced result was a genuine enrichment of the signature Durutti style that’s full of subtlety and still sounds fresh today. Includes a disc’s worth of related studio recordings and another of contemporary live material.

The Green Kingdom’s somewhat classic Expanses album reissued five years later in Expanded form. The original material is, to begin with, utterly gorgeous: lushly-textured ambience with unhurried techno beats fading in and out. The ten tracks are matched here by ten remixes, by artists like Tobias Hellkvist and Hotel Neon. Double CD reissue on Dronarivm.

Dub so spacious it makes the Grand Canyon look like a pot hole from The Idealist on the ever-interesting Hoga Nord. Inter Space Dub is minimal and psychedelic and anchored by an absolutely irrefutable sample. On the other side The Idealist connects dub with industrial and gets Throbbing Gristle's Genesis Breyer P-Orridge on vocals.

Swiss industrial legends Young Gods return with their first album in nine years. Data Mirage Tangram took shape from the most skeletal beginnings of songs being performed at a festival residency before being given bulk and structure on the road over a three year period. According to head Young God Franz Treichler, it’s the only time an album has arrived from a fully collaborative effort. Double LP and CD on Two Gentlemen.